With One Voice is working on two major reviews in the sector with arts consultant Phyllida Shaw: an International Literature Review on Arts and Homelessness that will bring together research, evaluation and documentation from the sector and academia; and an International Review of Cultural Spaces’ Responses to Homelessness which will include examples from Rio to Dallas to Manchester on how cultural spaces (libraries, galleries, museums, theatres, arts centres, open spaces, etc.) are welcoming homeless people to take part in the cultural offer.

Streetwise Opera’s international initiative, With One Voice, organised the first arts and homelessness exchange between Canada, the United States and the UK. 23 outstanding projects shared their work during this event, which was held in November 2017, as part of the ATSA État d'Urgence Festival in Montreal. Video by Salima Punjani for Streetwise Opera.

We are working with choirs in the UK to support the five homeless choirs that we set up in Rio as part of Streetwise Opera’s With One Voice international initiative.

Fairhaven Singers, a choir based in Cambridge, has announced it is twinning with the Museum of Tomorrow Choir in Rio. Both choirs have exchanged seasonal greetings films and the UK group, led by Ralph Woodward, has been raising funds for the project in Brazil.

Letitia and Katy here, reporting from the plane trip home to NYC, from Montreal. We just wrapped up an exciting and exhausting week-long exchange of arts and homelessness practitioners from Canada, United States and the UK, organized by With One Voice. We are full of ideas, reflections and next-steps, and very grateful to the organizers, Matt and Ellie, for welcoming Theatre of the Oppressed NYC into this international network!

With One Voice as an international movement celebrated its first birthday at the end of July! We're delighted to share our impacts so far in our 2016-17 evaluation report, which can be downloaded on our links and downloads page.

It started on an escalator 30 feet below ground at Cantagalo Metro station in Copacabana in Rio…A chat about a mutual deep love of Scotland; good friends, studying, living there, working there, choirs in homeless centres and by the time Matt Peacock (Director of With One Voice) and Shelly Coyne had emerged onto street level a seed had been sown and a question asked; could Scotland achieve the unthinkable and be the first country to have a fully integrated arts and homeless sector which is embedded in national government p

“We will be each other's refuge, we will be each other's home” is how the song “Home 3” goes. It was one of my favourites during the week I was lucky enough to spend in São Paulo when the Mouthful Quartet from the UK held a residency with the youth choir of the Guri Santa Marcelina project based in Brazil's largest city.

“I feel accomplished, because when you live on the streets, you feel worthless, nobody pays attention to us. But then when we sing, people start talking to you: “oh, I saw you singing…” and I think my little star is shining. I feel like I’m recognised as an artist.” – Valeria, member of the choir

‘How does dancing make you feel?’ – I asked a man in a park in Toyko during a rehearsal by Sokerissa, a dance company that works with homeless people. He looked up at the sky and I thought he wasn’t going to be able to answer. Then he suddenly looked at me and said ‘when I dance I forget everything else’.